He’s slanted. It’s the way he gets when he’s at this particular stage of inebriation — body off-kilter, dragonskin coat hung onto one shoulder (he’d gotten distracted with chasing a floating chocolate concoction in the process of taking it off), messy mop of ginger hair raised in parts and flipped over in others. Over the course of the evening, his syllables slide into one another, songs and shouts rolling off his tongue with supreme ease as he wanders and tilts his way through the crowd. 

George is drunk — no, slanted — and, soon enough, he is one of the very last stragglers around. 

As far as he’s concerned, there are only two places he can be when existing at such an angle: in the company of someone taking up the sorry task of sobering him up or — perhaps more idealistically for the intoxicated wizard — in the presence of another also tilted on their own axis, spinning to the finality of the moment that encircled them all.

“A toast!” He demands to the nearest concertgoer with a kind of revelry that only Ogden’s Old can imbue, and snaps his fingers to refill his glass of Firewhiskey. “To us, the very last Sisterheads to see them — EVER!”

Also, they did have literal volume: brushing the flowers produced the most memorable segments of the greatest hits from the famed songstress, sure to get stuck in anyone’s head, as they had so many times through Neville’s childhood. 

Raised as a wizard, Neville could not escape Celestina Warbeck. This benefit, strange as the idea of it was, had a horrible kind of inevitability. Also, since he lived and worked in Diagon, it just made sense to participate in this, though he did spare a wistful thought for the Weird Sisters concert he was missing. 

He’d really be glad to be rid of the bloody arch. He winced as the music began to play again. To his relief, the organizers had suggested that the arch could be auctioned off at the end of the night, which meant that his most terrible creation would finally be out of his shop.

seamus was, in a word, BUZZED. the swell of the crowd set his nerve endings alight and it’d take a lot to wipe the grin off his face. “ SLAINTE MOTHERFUCKERS ! ” he cried, taking a long swig from a bottle he’d found in the basement of the hog’s head - aberforth won’t miss it, he’ll just fill it up with water or lighter fluid or something and put it back - and winced and shook his head, the colours from the flares that clung to his hair shaking out around his head in a cloud of technicolor. “ isn’t this just fucking IMMENSE ? ”

Pansy did not want to be here. She’d been roped into going and she was less than pleased about it. She was happy to support the charity, publicly or otherwise, but that didn’t mean she wanted to listen to Celestina Warbeck all night. Of all people! She would much rather have been home or even at the Muggle theatre, but here she was. All because of Draco. Slick bastard had said it would be fun. At least there was wine. She took a long drink from her glass before turning to the person next to her. “So which of Ms. Warbeck’s songs is your favourite?” she asked, hoping her sarcasm wasn’t too obvious.

Percy was ecstatic (well, as “ecstatic” as Percy Weasley could be). Months and months ago when the Ministry had declared that all department heads (and sub-department heads) should at least make an attempt to go to the Benefit Concert, he’d gone to buy his ticket. It wasn’t until he’d been about to hand over the galleons that he’d realised it was Celestina Warbeck who was performing. He’d made a split second decision (a rarity for him) and bought 2 tickets instead of 1, deciding then and there to give the second ticket to his mum for a Christmas gift. Thankfully, she’d agreed to go with him.

Now, however, he’d lost her in the crowd and he was left holding 2 drinks. “Would you like this?” he asked the person nearest him. “I seem to have lost my date.”